A Bloody Angel
by Almost an Actress
Summary: Montparnasse has always hated being called "Monty." There's a reason. (Triggers apply.)


"_DON'T FUCKING CALL ME MONTY_!" he screamed, and balled up a fist before ramming it into Eponine's jaw as hard as he could. At first, she flew backwards, her arms wheeling dramatically. She teetered on her heels for what seemed like twenty years, but eventually she hit the floor with an audible thump and covered her face with one hand. On the floor, Eponine looked as vulnerable as she ever had. Her tangled dark hair was spread out around her head like a halo and a dark purple knot was quickly forming on her olive-toned skin. She looked so innocent and scared.

Montparnasse sank to his knees, clawing at his face as the flashback of another bloody angel overtook his vision.

XXX

_Montparnasse was six years old, an adorable and happy child. He had bright blue eyes, a shock of deep black hair, and pale skin that suggested he would be beautiful later in life. He skipped inside the slightly ramshackle house from where he'd been playing on the scrubby lawn. "Maman, Maman!" he cried in his childishly high voice. _

"_Yes, Monty?" his mother said. She was a tall, beautiful woman with long dark curls that cascaded down her back, eyes as green as the forest, and skin as pale as Snow White. Today, there was a large yellow welt across her Snow White skin that Monty was pretty sure was from Papa. _

"_Maman," Montparnasse implored, "since you're home with me all day, can we go get ice cream?" He clambered into her lap and smiled when she put her arms around him. The little boy cuddled into her chest, not hearing the little gasp his mother emitted as he brushed against an old bruise. _

"_Oh, baby, I want to go get ice cream with you, but Père would find out, and he wouldn't be happy. You know what he says, Monty…" his mother murmured. _

_Montparnasse sat up, stuck out his lower lip, lowered his voice, and did a surprisingly accurate impersonation of his father: "People only get treats and rewards when they've done something productive or noteworthy. Idleness doesn't warrant a reward!" He giggled. "Does Papa hate sweets, Maman?" Montparnasse had known he wouldn't really get ice cream; he was used to the rejection of special outings. Still, though, it never hurt to ask._

"_Your father doesn't hate sweets, Monty; he just wants you to do well. He wants you to understand that if you want something special, you have to do something responsible, like getting a good mark on your papers," his mother explained. She stroked his hair. "Besides, ice cream is an expensive treat. We're a bit low on funds right now, baby."_

"_What's funds, Maman?" Montparnasse questioned. He took his mother's hand for balance and leaned down to the floor, where a ragged teddy bear had been thrown. If Papa was home, the teddy bear would have been packed neatly away in Montparnasse's room, out of sight of the older man. Firstly, Papa didn't think boys – even young ones like Montparnasse – should have toys. He said it made them "pansy." And another thing, Papa didn't appreciate messes. The teddy bear was only brought out when it was just him and Maman, or when he was alone in his room._

"_Money, dear. It means we're a little low on money."_

"_Oh. Well…I think I have a dollar in my piggy bank. Do you want that, Maman?" Montparnasse didn't mention the fact that he'd been scrimping and saving that dollar for a very long time. (He knew it was selfish of him to want this, but he'd been wanting to buy a new pair of shoes for a while, as his were wearing thin. He didn't dare tell Maman about it; it would just cause her more stress.)_

"_Oh, Monty, keep your dollar. It's okay." Maman smiled gently and stroked his hair again. "Anyhow, let's focus on happy things, yes? We may not be able to go out and get ice cream, but I have a special video for you today. Would you like that?"_

_Montparnasse grinned blithely. "Yes! Oh, yes, I'd really like to see it! What's it about, Maman?" His excitement waned for a moment. "I shouldn't tell Papa, should I?" he asked. _

_Maman shook her head and smiled sadly. "Good boy. You've learned well. We won't tell Papa about this." She gently moved Montparnasse off of her lap and moved from the stained overstuffed chair the two had been occupying. She walked over to the TV set and rummaged around for a few moments before producing a battered VHS. _

"_Can I see?" Montparnasse asked from the chair, clutching the teddy bear to his chest. Maman brought the tape over, and he inspected it, trying to read the words printed in large yellow letters on the cover. "It says, uhm…oh!" Montparnasse gave a bubbly laugh. "It says my name! Monty!" He lifted the teddy bear to its feet and made it dance. "Look, Teddy, it's a movie about me!" _

_Maman laughed. "Do you know what the rest says?" she asked. She tried to encourage her son to read as much as possible. The little boy struggled with it, and he was in first grade already…._

"_Um…there's a P," Montparnasse said. He stared at the next letter for a long time, tracing it with his finger. "Wuh…Y. Y! P-Y-T…H…" He still had a bit of trouble recognizing _H_s. "…O-N. Um…P-Y-T-H-O-N. What's that, Maman?"_

"_Python," she supplied._

"_Monty Python. It says… 'And the…H-O-L…Y. G…R-A-I-L. Hoh-lee Gruh-gray-ul."_

"_Yes, dear," Maman said. "_Monty Python and the Holy Grail_. Like King Arthur." She popped the VHS in the player and gathered Montparnasse to her chest. Montparnasse positioned the teddy bear so it could see the TV. _

_As the movie played, Maman laughed quite a lot. Everything from gut-busting guffaws to helpless little giggles. This astounded Montparnasse, as he hadn't heard Maman laugh in a very long time. It made him happy. Most of the humor he didn't really get, and he thought the movie was a bit too violent at times, like when they made the bunny attack the knights, or when King Arthur cut off the Black Knight's arms and legs. Those parts scared Montparnasse quite a lot, but they made Maman laugh even harder, so he laughed as well. When he got too scared, though, he gripped Teddy a bit tighter, and that helped a bit._

_When it was over, Maman took the VHS tape and stowed it away somewhere where Papa wouldn't find it. "Well, Monty, what did you think?" she asked. "Those were my favorite movies as a little girl."_

_Montparnasse thought about the question. He didn't want to lie to his mother and say he had loved it, because that wasn't true. Some parts had been funny, like when the knights danced on the table and when the women said those funny things that made the youngest knight really uncomfortable. "It was fun," he decided on saying. If the odd movie made Maman happy, he thought, they made him happy, too. "Are there more Me Movies?" _

_Maman began to chuckle. "Me Movies?" she asked._

"_Yes. The Monty…things." Montparnasse didn't want to admit he'd forgotten the name of the tape. What if that made Maman sad?_

"_Me Movies," Maman chuckled softly. "Yes, we'll just call them that for now. There's plenty more, Monty. Are you interested in seeing more?"_

_Montparnasse mustered up a smile and said, "Yeah!" _

XXX

_Over the years, whenever he and his mother were alone, Montparnasse would view another of the "Me Movies." Even as he grew, he still called them that. They had seen pretty much every single one by the time he was eight, but they still watched them over and over. It was the one bonding point Montparnasse shared with his mother. As he grew, he had grown apart from the loving woman who had given her heart and soul to him as a child. He became more interested in things such as violent video games and cutting school. Papa wasn't exactly happy with the decisions Montparnasse was making, but he didn't try to stop the boy. _

_One day when he was fifteen, as Montparnasse hopped off of the school bus, he heard shouting from inside his house. Sometimes stuff like this happened. Papa would get angry with Mere for something she had done, he would shout for a while, maybe hit her a few times, and then go out and get drunk. It wasn't too big of a deal._

_Montparnasse walked around the block, waiting for the audible shouting to stop. He kicked a piece of broken glass around one side of the block until it skittered into the street and was subsequently abandoned. He was too lazy to retrieve it anyway. When he had rounded the block (stepping carefully around the crumbling patches of sidewalk) Montparnasse dared to walk through the patchy yard up to the door. He knocked a few times to announce his presence and opened up the door. _

"_You fucking bitch!" he heard his father slur. "You idiot! You've been doin' this since he was a kid?!"_

"_Y-yes. Bertrand, don't be cross with me, please. He was just a lonely boy. I just wanted him to watch a movie he might like –" His mother was abruptly cut off by another drunken cry. _

"_He coulda been doin' homework! He coulda been doin' sports! But _NO_! You just _had_ to have the kid home so you could watch those fucking movies! Fuckin' guilt trippin' the boy into coming home early so he could watch them! You selfish bitch!"_

"_It-it's not like that, Bertrand, I swear. It was a mother-son b-bonding time," his mother stammered. _

_Montparnasse crept up on the scene and watched from the hallway as his hulking father towered over his mother. The man was holding a half-empty bottle of cheap whisky and swinging it around to emphasize his point. "He'd be better off without a mother to bond with, you slut," Papa spat. "If you were out of the picture, he'd be tough and wouldn't act like one 'a them faggots!" _

_At that comment, Montparnasse turned tail and ran out of the house. He walked around the block a few more times before crossing the street and walking a few more blocks to the sketchy park a little ways from his house. He spent a good twenty minutes having a smoke (or three) and actually getting some homework done for once. When he had exhausted his meager cigarette supply and had actually finished his history and math homework, he wandered back in the direction of his shabby house._

_The shouting and stopped, and Montparnasse assumed Mere was hiding out in her room, quietly crying into a silk handkerchief given to her by her own mother. He would avoid her for maybe an hour while Papa stormed around the house, and then when Papa went off to get wasted, Montparnasse would come into the room and awkwardly hug his mother while she sobbed in his arms. _

_That was just how things went in his household. _

_He knocked at the door loudly before opening it and cautiously reentering the hallway as he had around thirty minutes ago. Montparnasse was met with an uncharacteristic silence. Usually, there was the noise of Papa stomping around and muttering loudly to himself, slamming doors and cabinets extra hard. Sometimes he would hear Maman sniffle pitifully in her room. Today, the only thing he could hear was his own breathing. _

Guess Papa couldn't do the cursory hour today_, Montparnasse thought sardonically. _He had to get out as soon as possible.

"_Maman?" he called cautiously. "You here?" He expected to hear a muffled sob or something, but there was still a silence. "Maman, it's me!" he called, stepping further inside the house and closing the door. _

_A bad feeling began to seep its way inside Montparnasse's stomach. The weird silence and the strange absence of Papa were getting to him. _She's fine_, he thought to himself. _She probably just fell asleep. _He jogged through the hall and into the living room…and that is when Montparnasse's child was shattered._

_He saw his mother face down on the floor in a puddle of blood, glass shards sparkling in the thick red liquid like a halo. The soft illumination of the cheap lamp in the corner caused light to dance from one shard to another, almost like they were winking at Montparnasse. _

"_M-Maman?" he stammered, slowly sinking to his knees beside his prostrate mother. He grabbed her arm and shook her, but fell back when he realized the arm was uncharacteristically cold and clammy. He took a few deep breaths and observed the heavy bruising on Maman's bare legs (she had been wearing a skirt) and when he dared to look up, how the top of her head had been bashed in._

_That was when Montparnasse screamed. He reeled backwards and scuttled away, sobs choking out of his throat and screams tearing at him. He hit the wall and kept screaming. _

_Maman was dead._

XXX

Montparnasse looked down at Eponine on the floor shuffled over to her on his knees. He raised a hand, saw her flinch, and then let the hand flutter to the floor limply. "Ep…?" he said slowly. She didn't respond. "Ep…please." He felt tears slowly begin to trickle down his face. "I'm sorry."

He brushed her hair back from her face and crushed her to his chest. "There's a reason I hate that name," he sobbed.


End file.
